PREPARE TO ROLL YOUR MOISTENED EYES
by Tony Frankel

If you are into political rallies that are jam-packed with guilt-inducing inspiration, then bundle up your harmonica, washtub bass, guitar, picket signs, seat cushions, and picnic; call forth a sense of injustice, and march to the hippie hills of Topanga. No, you’re not on your way to a fundraiser for Utopians United. Rather, compiler and editor Ellen Geer and the Theatricum Botanicum invite you to Carry It On!, a human slide show of ‘Great Moments in American History’: a compendium of prose, speech, and music by (mostly) famous Americans.

At first, it appears we are watching Children’s Theatre, but instead of The Brementown Musicians, we get a slavery theme, something like The Jamestown Slaveholders. Actors sing folk songs, and then speak in unison with a tone that is ominously close to passive-aggressive finger wagging; in a blink of an eye, we are transported to American Independence and plopped directly into the Civil War, when a youthful, unaffected Abe Lincoln (Mark Lewis) begins to offer snippets on the injustice of slavery, and magnificent William Dennis Hunt offers up a droll Walt Whitman. All told, there will be more than 50 Americans on display, some presented with astounding authenticity and others merely representational, which makes one long for a deeper interpretation. read more…